Quiet Talks about Jesus eBook

During the autumn before His death, while in attendance
on one of the Jerusalem feasts, the leaders are boasting
of their direct descent from Abraham, and attacking
Jesus. On their part the quarrel of words gets
very bitter. They ask sharply, “Who do
you pretend to be? Nobody can be as great as
Abraham; yet your words suggest that you think you
are.” Then came from Jesus’ lips
the words, spoken in all probability very quietly,
“Your father Abraham exulted that he might see
my day, and he saw it, and was glad.” It
is a tremendous statement, staggering to one who has
not yet grasped it.

In attempting to find its meaning, some of our writing
friends have supposed it means that, after Abraham’s
death, when he was in the other world, at the time
of Jesus being on the earth, he was conscious of Jesus
having come and was glad. But this hardly seems
likely, else it would read, “He sees,
and is glad.” The seeing and gladness
were both in a day gone by. Others have supposed
that it refers to the scene on Moriah’s top,
when the ram used as a sacrifice instead of Isaac enabled
Abraham to see ahead by faith, not actually,
the coming One. But this, too, seems a bit far-fetched,
because Abraham was surprised by the occurrences of
that day. He fully expected to sacrifice his
son, apparently, so there could be no exultant looking
forward to that day for him. And deeper
yet, the coming One was not expected to be a sacrifice,
but a king.

The natural meaning seems to lie back in Abraham’s
own life. Abraham was Israel’s link with
the idolatrous heathen, as well as the beginning of
the new life away from idolatry. He grew up among
an idolatrous people, yet in his heart there was a
yearning for the true God. Back in his old home
there came to him one day the definite inner voice
to cut loose from these people, his own dear kinsfolk,
and go out to a strange unknown land, with what seemed
an indefinite goal, and there would come to him a vision
of the true God.

It was a radical step for a man of seventy-five years
to take. He was living among his own kinsfolk.
His nest was feathered. It meant leaving a certainty
for an uncertainty. It meant breaking his habit
of life, a very hard thing to do, and starting out
on a wandering roaming life. Not unlikely his
neighbors thought it a queer thing, a wild goose chase,
this going off to a strange land in response to a
call of God that he might see a vision of the true
God. Decidedly visionary. But the old man
was clear about the voice. The fire burned within
to know God, the real true God. All else counted
as nothing against that. He would see God.
And a warming glow filled his heart and shone in his
eyes and kept him steady during the break, the good-byes,
the start away, the journeying among strangers.
Into the strange land he came, and pitched his tent.
And—­one night—­in his tent—­among
these strange Canaanites, there came the promised
vision. “Jehovah appeared unto Abraham,”
and tied up there anew with him the promise made back
in his native land. This seems to be the simple
explanation of these words about Abraham. “He
exulted that he might see my day. He saw
... and was glad.”